What's the 2026 City of Lubbock budget? Here's what to know as council talks are underway

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6 days ago

Budget season is upon us, and just like local school districts and Lubbock County, the Lubbock City Council must decide what the city's 2026 budget will look like.
Controlling the budget for several city departments and staff — including Lubbock Fire Rescue and police — the council and mayor must work out what objectives, initiatives, and projects will be funded next year and which will be axed.
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Check back daily to this story to see quick takeaways and talking points, and budget talks for the City of Lubbock start to heat up in Citizens Tower.
Day 3: City of Lubbock Budget talks canceled
After Tuesday's major setback from LCAD's calculations on the city's No‐New‐Revenue Tax Rate and the Voter Approval Tax Rate, Wednesday's meeting has been canceled.
It is yet to be seen if day four of the city's budget session occurs or if the city council will pick up its budget talks on Aug. 12.
Day 2: City budget torpeadoed by LCAD numbers, stalls talks on Wednesday
On Tuesday, after hours of discussion about various enterprise funds in the city budget, City Manager Jarrett Atkinson announced a major setback in the budget talks, which caused the council to cancel Wednesday's meeting.
Vital pieces of the budget come from the Lubbock Central Appraisal District — an independent tax entity set up by state law — which sends the city its preliminary and certified tax values.
Atkinson also said LCAD sends the city its calculations that form the No‐New‐Revenue Tax Rate and the Voter Approval Tax Rate. However, when the city received the calculations worksheet from LCAD on Monday evening, Atkinson said city staff took issue with it.
The issue is that the calculations are based on last year's levy, not the new year's levy, with Atkinson saying that maintenance and operations drop from $83 million to $81 million.
"What it means, if this ends up being right, in essence, the first $2 million of new revenue is just getting you to zero so that is a fundamental change to where we were," Atkinson said. "The short version, if you adopt a no new revenue tax rate this year, you'll have $2 million less than you did the year before, you get the $1.5 million off the new (revenue), so you're $500,000 in the hole."
For context, this means that the $1.5 million in new revenue from growth is not enough to offset the $2 million loss from the miscalculated base levy, meaning the city would $500,000 in the red.
Putting all of the projected miscalculations from LCAD into terms for the city budget and context, here's what we get:
The No-New-Revenue Tax Rate is the rate that would bring in the same amount of property tax revenue as the previous year
The calculated FY26 No-New-Revenue Tax Rate is 46.1938 cents — almost half a percent lower than the FY25 rate of 46.6749 cents.
The Voter Approval Rate is the highest rate the city can set without requiring a public election
The calculated FY26 Voter-Approval Tax Rate is 47.1053 cents — 9/100 of a penny higher than the FY25 rate of 47.012 cents.
This disputed miscalculation comes at a time when the city is working against an action item scheduled on Aug. 12 — propose a maximum tax rate for FY 26.
"This is, I don't know how to describe it," Atkinson said. "I've never seen anything like this. Your calculated numbers versus your worksheet numbers are usually within tenths of a percent on the total, and they are not."
While there were murmurs from the city council that they were ready to debate and give guidance to the city manager on how to move forward with the budget on Wednesday, the council decided to cancel Wednesday's scheduled meeting to allow city staff to work on the issue.
Thursday's meeting is still up in the air as city staff works with LCAD to verify its tax rate calculations, but is still scheduled to take place as of 5 p.m. Thursday.
Day 1: Setting the stage for the rest of the week.
Monday was all about presenting the staff-created budgets and the overall big picture budget. Here are the quick takeaways and a breakdown of each departmental budget.
City Manager Jarrett Atkinson told the council that the significant economic drivers for FY26 will be the recent drop in sales tax revenue — which he hopes to see increase in the future — and value of new property.
Proposed total revenue funding for FY26 is $953,898,000 — a 2.8% decrease from FY25.
Proposed total expenses for FY26 are $943,277,000 — a 2.7% decrease from FY25.
The budget factors in 3.75% more in total property taxes than last year's budget, equating to over $4.5 million in additional revenue to the FY26 budget.
Of that over $4.5 million, nearly $2 million comes from tax revenue from new property.
The proposed FY26 Property Tax Rate is $0.479365 — an increase from the FY25 Property Tax Rate of $0.470120.
The city's Certified Net Taxable Value rose to $28.5 billion, a $695.6 million increase or a 2.5% increase over the prior year.
Taking everything into account, Atkinson used the example of an average $222,300 single-family residential house that saw a 1% increase in taxable values and, impacted by the tax rate, would see a $31.45 increase next year.
What are each of the City of Lubbock's departments' budgets for FY26?
Here's what each city department is asking for and whether that is an increase or decrease from FY 2025's budget.
City Attorney — $2.7 million (decrease).
City Council — $601,937 (decrease).
City Manager — $1.9 million (decrease).
City Secretary — $1.9 million (decrease).
Facilities — $5.1 million (decrease).
Finance — $3.9 million (increase).
Human Resources — $1.25 million (decrease).
Internal Audit — $308,608 (increase).
Non-Departmental — $4.3 million (increase).
Communications & Public Engagement — $1 million (decrease).
Building Safety — $3.1 million (increase).
Code enforcement — $3 million (decrease).
Environmental Health & Vector — $2.35 million (increase).
Planning — $1.13 (decrease).
Libraries — $4.2 (decrease).
Museums — $1.4 (increase).
Parks & Recreation — $15 (increase).
Engineering — $1 million (increase).
Solid waste — $26.6 million (decrease).
Streets — $5.9 million (decrease).
2026 Street Maintenance Program — $14.5 million.
Traffic — $4.65 million (flat).
Animal Services — $3.9 million (increase).
Emergency Management — $3.9 million (increase).
Lubbock Fire Rescue $76.5 million (increase).
Municipal Court — $1.97 million (decrease).
Lubbock Police Department — $99 million (increase).
Public Health — $1.98 million (increase).
When will the Lubbock City Council meet to talk about the budget?
The council is set to convene the following days at 2 p.m. in Citizens Tower — 1314 Ave. K:
Monday, Aug. 4.
Tuesday, Aug. 5.
Wednesday, Aug. 6.
Thursday, Aug. 7.
For those who can not attend in person, the proceedings will be streamed at https://ci.lubbock.tx.us/pages/video-on-demand.
How can I watch, participate during Lubbock's budget workshops?
The workshops are open to the public; however, public participation is not allowed at this time as this is an opportunity for the city council to hear from heads of departments on their budget requests.
The finalized budget will be brought forward at a later date, with opportunities for public comment.
Mateo Rosiles is the Government & Public Policy reporter for the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal. Got a news tip for him? Email him: [e-mail].
This article originally appeared on Lubbock Avalanche-Journal: Lubbock city council, department staff talk taxes, craft 2026 budget
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